All Because of a Cigarette
by Kugeki
Summary: Asuma meets Uzumaki Kuroran two years before cannon, what will happen? takes place after Scroll incident. Smart, serious, FemNaru. Realistic as much as possible. Unplanned hiatus over, writing resuming, possible rewrite.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto in any way shape or form, and I am making no profit of any kind off of this work, save for my own enjoyment.**

**With that said, enjoy the story, that will be the only disclaimer in this story and it will apply to everything written from this point onwards. All relevant Author Notes will be at the end of the chapter from now on unless it is a warning of some kind.**

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><p><strong>All Because of a Cigarette<strong>

**Chapter 1: Sarutobi Asuma, meet Uzumaki Kuroran**

Sarutobi Asuma was a heavy smoker, he freely admitted it, and everyone who knew him knew it. Most people he knew just tolerated the cancer sticks he was so fond of, but there was one person who loved them just as much as he did. There was one girl who always hung out around his favorite smoking spot, the top of the Hokage monument behind his father's head. She was blonde, with tan skin and shockingly blue eyes; she was a few years younger than him, twenty one, and she always had a cigarette between her lips, the same brand he smoked almost religiously.

He first saw her up there two years ago, and pretty soon they started talking and became fast friends. He found out that her name was Gekiryuu Tsubaki; she liked ramen, sake and dango, disliked perverted men, noisy kids, emos and bigots and enjoyed smoking, gardening, playing the flute and cooking. Her favorite colors were black red, purple and orange, but never all together.

Today, Asuma was heading up to the top of the Hokage monument for a smoke with Tsubaki, as was their long established tradition for every afternoon when he wasn't on a mission. Unfortunately this would be probably the last time for a while that he would be able to see her, because of his decision to take a genin team this year.

Walking up the last of the stairs to the top of the monument, he saw a familiar sight, Tsubaki standing looking out over Konoha with a lit cigarette trailing smoke in her mouth, her hair flowing gently in the light breeze that ghosted over the top of the monument. She turns her head to catch sight of him with one eye and smiles.

"Hey, Asuma-kun, how was your day?" she asks in a bright happy tone, a smile firmly in place on her face as she takes a drag and exhales the smoke in a narrow stream after holding it in her lungs for a moment.

Asuma walks over next to her and pulls out his second pack of the day, pulling out a smoke of his own and lighting it with a practiced ease. He relaxes for a moment, taking a few puffs on the cancer stick before answering his friend's question, "I'm fine, but my free time is gonna be pretty limited in a few days for the foreseeable future, I'm taking a genin team this year."

Tsubaki laughs, "Who knows, maybe they'll fail your test. Do you know what the teams will be this year?"

Asuma looks at her oddly, "Why the sudden interest in the genin? You never really were curious about anything ninja related before?"

Tsubaki gives a wry grin, "I want to know because the real me is one of those genin hopefuls. I suppose it is time you knew who Tsubaki really is, Asuma-kun." She lifts her hand into a half ram seal and mutters, "Kai!" A small puff of smoke covers her body and when it clears, it reveals a person who is very similar to Tsubaki, but also different in a few key ways.

First and most noticeable is her age and height, or really the lack thereof. She looks to be eight or nine years younger than Tsubaki, and a good seven inches shorter, standing at five foot even. Three faint whisker marks run across each cheek, and what appears to be some kind of dark purple tribal tattoo begins on the right side of her neck and disappears under her shirt, reappearing from under her right sleeve, on her forearm. Her hair is pulled into two substantial ponytails a instead of falling freely down her back; her body is completely devoid of unnecessary fat, being almost totally composed of toned, solid muscle from what he can see. Also, she is obviously much less developed than her apparent alternate persona.

She still has the cancer stick held between her lips though; there is one thing that would seemingly never change. She gives him a wry grin, "Sorry for fooling you for two years, but I didn't want to be seen moving around the village so I came up with Tsubaki and the Kage Henge to help me move around without being noticed by those bigoted fools.

"Imagine my surprise when I met someone up at my favorite spot who actually took the time to get to know me. I was really happy; you were my first real friend outside of Hokage-ojiisan and the Ichiraku family. I actually started smoking because it helped me cope with the stress of my life, and mainly because of hanging out with you, I came to really enjoy it because of all the good memories it brought up.

"At first… I was really wary of being friends with anyone because of my bad experiences with the villagers and other students at the Academy, but you seemed like a nice person so I decided to give you a chance. Do you remember how about a month after we met I asked you what you thought about the 'Uzumaki girl'? I know I said that since I had only moved here a few years ago I didn't know why everyone treated her like hellspawn when she seemed like a nice girl. I was surprised when I found out that you had a good opinion of me, unlike a lot of the other villagers. It was nice to know that someone was on my side, at least to a degree."

Asuma looks at her, still a little shocked by the revelation that his good friend was in fact the pariah of Konoha, "So, Tsubaki was a fake person? Everything you told me about her was one big story?" He sounds a little hurt, and the girl, Uzumaki Kuroran flinches slightly.

"No, the only things that were fake were my name and age, everything else was the real me, I just put a false face on it. I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings but I wasn't sure if I should tell you the truth… I have a lot of trust issues, and even if you are my friend, I don't always have a good idea what I could safely tell you," she sounds really sad when she says this, and she looks down at the ground with a morose expression on her face.

Asuma sighs, "It's all right, I really can't fault you for not telling me if even half the stories I have heard from my old man about how hard your life has been are true, and I don't doubt that they are. But I still want to know why you wanted to know the teams for this year, even if you are part of the graduating class."

Kuroran nods, getting back into a happy mood, "I want to know because if I am on a team with the Uchiha runt or that perverted scarecrow as a sensei I will probably commit murder. Sasuke because he is an arrogant shitstain and Kakashi… I don't feel comfortable talking about it right now, suffice to say that he did, or rather did not do something he was supposed to do in the past that nearly caused my death and did result in serious mental trauma that is still there today. Maybe I'll tell you about it someday."

Asuma nods and says, "Alright, I'll tell you. I know for a fact that the current plan is to put you on a team with Haruno Sakura and Uchiha Sasuke with Kakashi as sensei. Fortunately for you, the teams are not finalized yet, I can probably have you put on my team if I request you and give a good reason for it."

Kuroran looks horrified at the prospect of being on a team with the two people she hates most in the village, "Okay, you need a reason, tell ojii-san that you met me and I got your interest, we talked and you decided to test me for my affinity and found out I was a wind type. That should do it; and for the record, I have a strong wind affinity and a crazy strong water affinity, I can even show you." She reaches into a back pocket and pulls out a small square piece of paper and holds it in her palm before channeling some chakra into it. The paper splits in half before both halves literally dissolve into water, leaving a good sized puddle in her small hand and a tiny waterfall coming off the sides and between her fingers.

She smirks, "Told you…" Asuma looks on in surprise, it was nearly unheard of for a genin to have two affinities, let alone one as powerful as her water affinity, the last person he knew of with that kind of water affinity was the Nidaime Hokage; this was ridiculous! She looks at him seriously, "Don't tell ojii-san about my water affinity, please. That's my trump card, and I don't want to let it get out so soon."

Asuma nods, "Okay, Kuro-chan. I'll talk to my old man and request you on my team. Till then have a nice day, and I'll see you at orientation, hopefully on my team." He vanishes in a puff of smoke, leaving Kuroran to finish her cigarette and leave the monument. She looks out over the village one last time.

"What a nice view… it is always a beautiful view of the sunset up here…" she sighs wistfully before turning and leaving the monument.

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><p><strong>End Chapter 1 of All Because of a Cigarette<strong>


	2. Chapter 2

**All Because of a Cigarette**

**Chapter 2: Nine Lives**

Kuroran walked through the nearly deserted streets of Konoha at a leisurely pace, taking a circuitous route back to her apartment to help her think. She really hoped that Asuma had managed to talk the Old Man into placing her with his team instead, if she had to be on a team with the Uchiha brat and... that silver haired sadistic pedophile... Well, she didn't know what she would do; probably kill them both and then go missing nin or something just as stupid.

A pained sigh escaped her lips as thinking of Hatake brought back memories she had done her best to numb in full force. Her left hand unconsciously went to her abdomen as she remembered the pain of that night four years ago... She started to shake slightly as the memory became more vivid, staggering to one of the walls of an apartment building at the side of the road and slumping against it as she desperately fought to repress the horrible images and phantom feelings.

A few tears leaked from the corners of her eyes as she got herself under control, viciously burying the memories of that day as deep as she could make them go. A weak, shuddering gasp escaped her lips as she pushed herself back to her feet and walked down the road again, this time at a much faster pace. In her mind she had set a new destination, the place she always went when she had relived a memory of that day.

The rest of the journey was a numb blur to her as she quickly walked through the dark streets of her home village. Half an hour later she had reached her favorite place in the whole village, a little clearing in the heart of the Konoha forest with a crystal clear pool of cool water fed by a small spring and leading into a fast flowing brook that tumbled over a rocky stream bed that went to the edge of the clearing and beyond. Upon seeing the comforting sight of her private sanctuary, her face relaxes as does her body. Deciding to go for a soak to clear her head, she pulls her black top over her head and drops it to the ground, the bindings that held her small breasts following a second later. She quickly strips out of the rest of her clothes and walks into the water, shivering slightly at the shock of the water on her skin. She reaches up and unties the two ponytails that held her hair up, letting the thick, heavy curtain of golden hair fall around her head, extending to the middle of her back. She submerges her body in the water and swims to the center of the pool, reemerging a moment later with a peaceful smile on her face.

"I always feel better after I do that..." she says softly to no one in particular. She just soaks in the pool for a good twenty minutes before climbing out and drying off with a very simple Fuuton ninjutsu. She gets dressed at a lazy pace, enjoying the night air; when she has her shorts and wraps on, a rustle in the treeline gets her attention and her head snaps in that direction.

"Come out, before I make you," an eerily familiar laugh reaches her ears a moment before one of the people she liked least stepped out of the forest, a large scroll over his shoulder. "Mizuki... what the hell are you doing out here? Watching me take a bath, you sick bastard? And what's with the scroll?"

The silver haired chunin instructor smirks, malicious intent rolling off of him, "Oh, I was just returning this to Orochimaru-sama when I stumbled across a demon going for a swim... how could I resist the chance to rid the village of such a stain on its honor. Konoha's demon bitch, the pariah of the village and the girl with the devil's luck... I wonder, do you know why everyone in the village hates you? Why you will never find acceptance in life?

"It's all very secret, you see. The Sandaime passed a law the day after the Kyuubi attack, a law that everyone but you was allowed to know of, under pain of death for anyone who revealed the truth to any member of the younger generations, especially you... the law was that we were never to tell you that you are the Kyuubi no Yoko! The Yondaime imprisoned you in that form to save the village, _you_ are the demon that killed so many that night twelve years ago! And now I will become a hero by killing you you monster!"

Kuroran felt her body go cold, there was no way... she wasn't a demon... was she? "Y-you're lying to me, there is no way that's true. I would know if I was a demon! I haven't done anything to anyone in this village!"

Mizuki sneers at her contemptuously as he reaches for the giant shuriken on his back, "You haven't done anything? Don't make me laugh; _you _killed so many when you attacked this village, you even killed the Yondaime. Don't insult me by trying to play innocent fox brat! Just die quietly like the good little demon whore you are..." He throws the shuriken at her with an exaggerated and telegraphed swing of his arm. Something that she should have seen coming from a mile away, and indeed she did see it, but her mind was in such turmoil that she paid it no mind.

"_I'm not a demon, ojii-san would have told me if I was... but, maybe he wouldn't have? Why would he tell me I was a demon if telling me could have sent me on a rampage. Oh god, what if I really am a demon? Maybe it would be better if I just let him kill me... it's not like anyone will miss a me..."_ as her thoughts went down that dark road, the shuriken drew ever closer, until a dark, enraged voice in her head started screaming at her.

"**You damn fool mortal! How dare you have the gall to believe that you could be me! Now move, or we will both die here!"** the voice is deep, powerful and bursting with anger. It did what she could not and spurred her to action, swiftly leaping to the side, she dodged the large weapon...

Most of her anyway, her right arm wasn't as fortunate as the rest of her body, and the shuriken sliced it clean off an inch below her shoulder.

She screamed as the grass was splattered with her blood, white hot agony coursed through her body in time with the blood spurting from the clearly fatal injury. Her remaining hand came up in a vain effort to stem the bleeding, but she fell to the ground as her body grew numb, her darkening eyes gazing up at the chunin who had killed her.

"You bastard..." she breathes out slowly. She didn't want to die, not here, not now not ever! _"I won't die, I can't die here... I still have too much to do! I... don't want...to...die..."_ Finally her world faded to darkness, the last thing she heard was Mizuki's crazed laughter.

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><p>White, bright, endless white, that was all she saw until a great wall of red entered her vision as it sharpened into focus and she sat up, "What... where am I?"<p>

The same deep and powerful voice from earlier answered her, **"Congratulations brat. You just succeeded at dying twelve years into your miserable existence. You sicken me with your attitude, girl. I will not have my container living as vermin for others to tread on, it is an insult and a disgrace to my power to have such a weak Jinchuriki."**

Kuroran looked up apprehensively, and had her fears confirmed by the presence of a colossal fox with crimson fur, nine lashing tails and a pair of red eyes overflowing with malice. Those eyes were glaring at her with so much anger that she felt as if she was liable to burst into flames at any given moment under the demon's stare.

"K-Kyuubi... what do you mean dying? Where is that bastard Mizuki, I need to pay him back for... oh god, I-I really am dead... why didn't I remember that? What did you do to me you damn fox!" she raged as her memories of the last moments of her life solidified in her head, she knew the fox was responsible for bringing her here, wherever here was. _"I can't be dead, I still have so many things I wanted to do with my life, how could this happen to me? Why do these things always happen to me?"_

She wasn't expecting an answer to her thoughts, but the fox in front of her gave her one anyway, **"You are dead, accept it and get over it. You aren't dead permanently, not yet anyway, however much I wish you were. Your mother never came this close to death when I was sealed inside of her, she wasn't weak like you, so I never had this conversation with her.**

"My mother? What about my mother, tell me dammit! Now!" Kuroran demands as her eyes widen at the mention of one of the parents she knew nothing about.

"**Be Silent, human!"** the great fox's voice was so loud as to shake the heavens down, and Kuroran quieted, sufficiently cowed by the angry Biju.

"**As I said, you are not dead permanently, as my host, in addition to all the other side effects of having my youki inside of you, you gain a wonderful little ability to return from death nine times in your lifespan, once for each of my tails; each time you do, you will lose a little of your humanity, eventually becoming a true demon under my control if you die nine times. What the loss of your humanity entails even I don't know, but it should be entertaining to find out."**

"What... die nine times, loss of humanity? What does that mean? Answer me!" her voice fades even to her own ears as the white space fades to black and the fox melts away into nothingness.

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><p>Her eyes open to see Mizuki standing on the ground, facing away from her, shouting at someone she couldn't see.<p>

"Yes, I killed the demon! I did the village a service, you should be giving me a medal for ridding the world of such a menace!" his voice is crazed and he is gesticulating wildly with his arms.

She turns her head to look at where her arm should have been, but was surprised to see her arm still there, _"Wait, this isn't my arm, my arm is still on the ground over there! What happened,did it grow back? No, it feels different, stronger... almost inhuman... is this what the fox was talking about? Losing my humanity?"_ She feels vitality coursing through her body again, and she pushes herself to her feet behind the man who killed her once already. There was no way she was going to let him do that again, apparently she had nine lives, eight now, she supposed, but that didn't mean she was going to die easily dammit!

She rose fully to her feet and smirked in a positively terrifying manner, not that anyone saw it. She decided to freak him out some, "Hello, Mizuki-sensei..." Her voice cuts off his rant, and he spins around, a hand going to his kunai pouch.

"B-but... how, you were dead! I saw you die!" he screams in a panic. "This just proves it, you are a demon! No human could survive an injury like that without medical attention! This time I really will kill you!" He rushes at her with a crazed light in his eyes, leading with a wild swing from his kunai.

Kuroran ducks under the swing and surges upward towards the man. Her eyes meet his own a split second before she slams her open right hand into the man's chest over his sternum. Her new hand. She had intended for the blow to stun him, instead she watches in sick fascination as the force of the strike caves in his chest, his ribs shattering and fragmenting inside of him like some kind of bomb. She feels as his organs are crushed to a paste by the power of the palm strike. Blood erupts from his mouth and splatters across her face and chest as he lets out a forceful exhalation from his collapsed lungs. His eyes widen in shock as he is thrown backwards by Kuroran's strike, hitting the ground with a heavy thud.

She looks at her hand in shock, heedless of the blood all over her face, _"What in the hell? Since when did I get super crazy strength in my arm... Oh, wait, it probably happened when this damn thing grew back..."_

She looks over at the person Mizuki was talking to, a man in his early twenties with a scar across the bridge of his nose and brown hair tied up in a pineapple like style, "Iruka-sensei? What are you doing here?"

A moment of silence passes as Iruka tries to absorb the absurdity of what had just happened, "Um.. I was chasing Mizuki after he stole the forbidden scroll of seals from the Hokage Tower... What were you doing here, and in that state of dress?" Iruka also politely averts his eyes as Kuroran finally takes into account what she was wearing: bandages over her chest and a pair of very tight, very short shorts. Altogether not a great outfit for preserving one's modesty. She turns a dark red and squeaks slightly, hurrying over to the remainder of her clothes and donning them in record time.

"I'm decent now Iruka-sensei... sorry you saw me like that, I had just gotten out of the water when Mizuki found me..." she snorts bitterly, "Stupid prick was probably watching me for a while before I got out... And you said that that scroll is _the _forbidden scroll of seals? No wonder it looked familiar..."

Iruka looks at her questioningly, but when she looks as if there will be no elaboration forthcoming on her part, Iruka sighs, "Anyway, the Anbu should be here soon, I signaled them before I confronted Mizuki." True to his word, a moment later a squad of the elite shinobi land in the clearing. The only one wearing a white cloak addressed Iruka.

"I see that things have been taken care of here, though it would have been better if you left him alive Iruka-san," the cat masked Anbu said in a quiet voice.

Iruka points to Kuroran, "Actually, I wasn't the one who killed him, Kuroran-kun was..."

The cat masked captain looks over at the blonde girl, "Kuro-chan? You did that to him?" Kuroran nods, "Pretty good job, a little messy, but it got the job done I suppose. Still, we could have used any information he had..."

Kuroran sighs, "Yeah, Cat-neesan... for what it is worth he said that he was taking the scroll to Orochimaru. That, and... he told me about the Kyuubi..." Cat sucks in a breath, as does Iruka, while the rest of the Anbu squad tenses.

"Relax... I'm not going to snap and go on a rampage or anything. I'm just glad I know why people hate me now..." she says tiredly, reaching into a pocket for a pack of cigarettes and her lighter. A moment later she is holding a lit cigarette in her mouth, much to Iruka's protest.

"Kuroran! Where did you get those, they're terrible for you, put it out now!" Iruka shouts in shock.

Kuroran glares at him, "Iruka-sensei, I've been smoking for a long time, and it hasn't bothered me one bit... so shut up about the cigarette so we can go report to ojii-san..." Her voice is low and dangerous sounding, and Iruka unconsciously swallows nervously, her glare was just as scary as Anko's after you messed with her dango...

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><p><strong>End Chapter 2 of All Because of a Cigarette<strong>

**A/N: I must say, I didn't expect my first review for the story to be a flame, but it gave me the incentive to go off on this little rant, which I will preface with the text of the review, by the anonymous reviewer "kitsunebi".**

"the naem of the femael naurto is stupid! why do you have to go against cannon? naurto is a dude, not a girl. girl ninja are weak anyway! yu suck at writing, you over perfect grammer person! i bet youv nevr even got laid, you pussy. i will never read won of ur stories again, u shit author!"

**Okay, first thing is first, kitsunebi, you have no business commenting on my grammar when yours is worse than what I could do in first grade. If you are going to flame me about my story and include my grammar as one of your issues (even if your issue makes no logical sense, isn't a story with good grammar better than one with shitty grammar?) at least have the decency to match or exceed the quality of my own in your flame.**

**On another note, Kuroran's name is stupid you say? Well, I think it's a hell of a lot better than kitsunebi for an anonymous flamer, talk about unoriginal. And I am pretty sure that the last time I checked, the whole point of fanfiction was to rewrite canon in your own way, if you want to read canon so badly, read Kishimoto-sensei's manga and stay the hell off of FF. And that point is also why my version of Naruto is of the female persuasion**

"**Girl ninja are weak"? Oh boy my friend, you have not made any friends with that statement, my girlfriend (who read your review over my shoulder) wants to castrate you now. And that leads into my next point. Don't make comments about other people's sex lives you useless prick, especially when the only reason you are probably saying that I get nothing is because you are insecure about your own lack of experience... Or maybe you're just a jealous bastard who couldn't get it up if he took three viagra? Yeah, I think that fits you better.**

**Okay, rant over. Sorry to anyone who read that who is not kitsunebi but I really had to get that off of my chest. Thank you to everyone else who reviewed my story, and thank you as well to all those who read but did not review, I love you all (in a non romantic sense of course, otherwise my girlfriend would kill me painfully).**

**A/N 2: I also bet that none of you saw the nine lives thing coming, I actually just came up with it out of the blue and said to myself, "I've never seen this done before, so I'll try it". What are the secrets of her new arm, and what the "loss of humanity" entails will have to be figured out by you all later on.**

**Also, I promise that the whole Kakashi thing will be explained in detail eventually, and I would like to reinforce the fact that this will not be a bashing fic, Kakashi's actions will be explained and he will redeem himself eventually.**

**See you all next time.**


	3. Important notice

Sorry for the long absence, I would like to announce that I am back after a string of real life snafus and that neither of my fics are dead. I will be taking a bit of time to revise and flesh out what is currently up for ABOAC before adding new chapters, but it shouldn't take too long. I would like to thank everyone who reviewed, followed and/or favorited this work. It really made me happy to see that I had people interested when I finally came back to the site. Thank you all, I will have new content soon.

Kugeki


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